What happened to Grace?

So I lived in Fairbanks, Alaska for a while when I was in grad school. It really was a good place, and I'd go back if I had an opportunity. Fairbanks left some marks on me, though. I moved up there with my first wife in 1997. Both of us were born and raised in Southern Baptist Churches (not literally, of course: I was born in a hospital, and raised in my parents house). We quickly got involved in a baptist church in Fairbanks, and made a lot of friends. I eventually became the young couples Sunday school teacher, the youth pastor, worship team member, and for one summer, the preacher. I attended all the meetings, went to the men's group functions, had a prayer partner - if it happened at or because of church, I was probably involved somehow. And I liked it, mostly. I had friends. I was important to people and they all treated me mostly with respect.

Then I started to question if that's really all there was to being a Christian: being nice to each other and filling positions in church programs. I slowly became disillusioned by it and wanted out. Eventually, I became very rebellious against God and church, but managed to keep it to myself for the most part. None of my church friends really cared what was going on with me, though, until my wife and I split. Within seconds, all of these people whom I had gladly served at church for several years, who had been my friends, scattered. I was an instant pariah. If anyone did speak to me, it was to be uncomfortably polite ("Just don't look him in the eye, dear...") or to castigate me. I left that church feeling used up, and discarded. In a word, I was lied to by people who had been like family.

I was still in school, studying geology, all this time. Now in your average American geology department, religious faith of any kind is a non-native species. What really sticks in my memory, though, is that when my non-believer friends learned what was happening in my life, they actually rallied around me. While they may have also thought I was making some bad choices, they remained my friends just the same. They took care of me. It all seemed, and still seems, so backwards.

I think back on those times now, and I still feel a little prickly about it. I never completely lost my faith in God, and the precepts of Christianity spelled out in the Bible resonate with more truth now than ever. But I have to say, I lost a lot of faith in Christians. I haven't yet recovered much of it, either. I have a hard time understanding why Christians - those who are supposed to understand grace as God meant it - are the most unforgiving, petty, small, dark-hearted, hateful people you'd ever want to meet. I realize I am generalizing, and I know there are some Christians who genuinely reflect the grace and peace of Christ. I just wish I knew where they all are.

Neon Jesus

So I started playing on a team in a church basketball league recently. I know next to nothing about the sport, and except for my freakish height (I am 6' 5"), offer very little to the team. But it's good exercise, and as non-athletic as I am, I still relish the competitiveness of sports. So I play basketball now.

Being a church league, though, there seems to be a need to make basketball into something more. I am a Christian myself, and actually attend the church that sponsors and hosts the league; I understand the biblical call to do all things for the glory of God. Fine. I also understand Jesus's exhortation to go out into all the world and make disciples. Again, fine. There seems to be a misunderstanding, though, about how to apply church-league basketball to these goals. Let me offer an example. In the three weeks or so that the league has been in play, I have been told no fewer than a half dozen times that bad language will not be tolerated. This, evidently, is the greatest offense one can commit on the court, and the only thing so far mentioned that will result in ejection from a game. And that's fine, I guess, but I wonder why bad language is seen as such an unforgivable infraction? The reason, I am told, is that church basketball is a "witnessing opportunity." In other words, guys who don't already believe in Christ will be convinced by our squeaky-clean language that Jesus loves them and offers abundant life. Really? Is this what Christian spirituality and discipleship is about - putting on a good face, and being nice? I think this is what keeps many people away from Christ. Jesus offered more than a self-help course in dressing for success, didn't he?

My basketball experience really is a microcosm of church life in general. We go to our various church functions, and we speak the right language. We spout the accepted answers to complex issues with very little thought, unaware that we gloss over some very deeply felt questions. In return we offer superficial answers, without even really knowing what we're saying. But as long as we appear before others as being spiritually insightful and pious, it's all good - nevermind our imperfect reality.

I think it's OK for Christians to play basketball just because it's fun. While I won't really advocate using bad language, I mean honestly, is it the worst thing that could happen?

Return your seats to the upright position

So I saw this story about a fat guy on Air France today. Since just this week I made a whirlwind tour of airports - St. Louis, Houston, Anchorage, Seattle, back to Houston, and home again to St. Louis - all in the space of about thirty hours, I thought the story was particularly germaine. For those too lazy to take a break and read the story linked above, here's the gist:

Some big fat guy tried to get on a flight and the French ticket agent - normally such a caring and polite breed - told him that if you take up two seats, you have to pay for two seats. The fat guy got his feelings hurt, naturally, and is suing the airline. Probably the ticket agent didn't explain that if you buy two tickets, you get two meals. It's a win-win, really. But I digress.

This whole mess about charging fat guys extra because they take up too much space is a slippery slope, if you think about it. I can already see the next step - making skinny guys share their seat with someone else. I mean how can airlines justify giving some beanpole an entire seat when there's plenty of room left over for another skeleton or an unaccompanied minor (if the parents were there they'd probably object, the big whiners).

And I think this is what happened to me on my flight from Anchorage to Seattle, and continuing on Houston. Because I am of above average height, I usually try to get an exit row seat so I have a little extra room. but on this particular trip I was travelling with two kids - mine, it turns out - and they aren't allowed in the exit rows. So I wedged myself into the less-than-generous normal seat, and no sooner did we get up to cruising altitude, than the woman in front of me reclined her seat as far back as it would go. She was completely undeterred by the howls of pain which originated in my kneecaps, moved past my vocal chords, and escaped from my mouth. She was back far enough that while I was reading my book, I kept choking on her hair. She was very nearly lying in my lap. The side effect of this was that since I had to rearrange myself to accomodate her, every time the flight attendant came by with a cart of some sort, she either ran over my foot, banged me in the knee, or both.

What really annoyed me, though, was that when her meal came, she left the seat back in the reclined position! It just seems spiteful, really. She's doing extra work to sit up and eat, just so she can reserve her spot in my lap. I guess she was afraid someone else might come and sit there.

After the meal was over, she actually tried to get the seat down farther. Fortunately for my groin, the seat had its mechanical limits. She seemed disappointed, looking up at me from my lap. "Sorry, sweetheart," I told her. "I paid for the whole seat."

--------------------------

After we got to Houston, having just missed our connection to St. Louis - literally by seconds (thanks a lot, Continental) - we got to sit at George Bush International Airport for about 4 hours. While we were waiting, I eventually needed to visit the restroom. When I entered, what I found there horrified me on many different levels. Seated in the first stall, trousers bunched at his ankles, was a man conducting business both on the toilet and on the cell phone, simultaneously. I have to wonder if the other party to the cell phone deal was aware that he didn't have his colleague's undivided attention. I mean honestly, there is such a thing as too much connectivity, isn't there? There's a reason pay phones never really caught on in the john. Just because you can make a call there, doesn't mean you should. And to actually conduct business like that? "Yeah, Phil, I'll get those contracts...right...over..." his voice morphing into a strained grunt. Classy.

Would you have noticed that?

So my wife and I have developed a little game that bears sharing with the world at large. We call this game "Would you have noticed that at the mall." The object of the game is to casually brush up against your opponent, touching them in what would otherwise be an inappropriate manner (if you know what I mean) without the recipient of the harrassing gesture realizing they had been groped. It is sort of like combining sexual harassment with picking pockets. Bill Clinton meets the Artful Dodger, as it were. There are no hard and fast rules so creativity is encouraged. So long as the player on offense (a term which, in this case, has meaning on several levels) derives some purile satisfaction, and the defensive player remains unaware of your advances, you win! After you execute your move, you ask your opponent, "Would you have noticed that if a stranger did that to you at the mall?" If you are met with rolling eyes and a disgusted, "Yes, I would," then you lose (although the awkward, ham-fisted feel you just copped is your to treasure forever). If on the other hand, the harassee seems not to know what you're talking about, congratulations!

One problem we haven't quite ironed out of the game is that it is pretty easy for the defensive player to cheat. Merely asking the "would you have noticed that" question is a big tip off that a groping has occurred. Even if the feel itself was undetected, going for the win gives it away. So far we have had to rely on each other's honesty, which, for us, seems to be working out reasonably well. My wife and I have had a game going for a few years now, and the score is pretty well tied. If you decide to play, you'll want to assess the honesty of your potential opponents. You'll also want to advise your adversary of your intent to play, and be sure they are up for the game. Otherwise, if you find out that you suck at it, you may get more than the aforementioned disgusted eyeroll - I can not be held responsible for any lawsuits, restraining orders, or bodily injury sustained by you or anyone else in connection with an ill-advised and poorly timed WYHNTATM match.

I have noticed that the game seems to be catching on with the general public. Almost every time I am at an airport, on any form of public transportation, or at an actual mall, someone tries to go a round with me. I usually notice, though, and often tell the other player that I know what they did. I haven't yet developed my skills to the point where I feel comfortable initiating a match with strangers, though.

What's that? Oh, I am 35 years old. Why do you ask?

My what is elevated?

So a couple of months ago I went to see a doctor, an engagement which included a blood-letting. The nurse used a needle, not a leach, and afterward I didn't really feel any relief from having the bad blood extracted. In fact, when the initial test results came back, they showed I have too much bilirubin in my blood. I am given to understand that bilirubin is formed when red blood cells decompose, and the liver is supposed to clean the bilirubin out. Mine, however, does not. After a second test a couple of weeks ago, the doctor determined that I am afflicted with a condition called Gilbert's Syndrome. It's named after a French guy, evidently, as it is pronounced "zhil-bear." It makes me feel very sophisticated to have such an elegant sounding disease.

So how long do I have, doc? Give it to me straight...don't sugar coat it. If I don't eat a pound of bacon for breakfast every morning, continue to not smoke, don't step in front of any moving cars, or go hunting with the vice president, the best I can hope for is another fifty-five years (sixty, tops). Gilbert's Sydrome is a completely benign, asymptomatic condition that hardly warrants status as a syndrome. Typical of the French, really. Even their diseases run away screaming like a girl, and let cholesterol (the bad kind), RJ Reynolds, traffic accidents, and shotgun-toting politicians do their dirty work.

Now that I have a real disease, my first order of business is to get myself a special license plate so I can park in handicap spaces. Whenever I go to work, or the library, or the grocery store, I see parking lots that have about two dozen handicap spaces, and there are never more than a couple of actually disabled people in whatever place you're going to. Even at a crowded mall, you never see more than maybe four wheelchairs or people on crutches. It used to really bother me that all those special spaces went unused, or else were occupied by what I thought were perfectly healthy reletives of disabled people just taking advantage of the hadicapped license plate. Maybe they too were suffering from Gilbert's Syndrome, or some other similarly impotent French disease. Anyway, now that I am disabled, I will appreciate not having to trundle myself, bilirubin-laden blood and all, that extra thirty feet from the parking lot into the Piggly Wiggly. I am also thinking of forcing my landlord, through the court system if necessary, to build a wheelchair ramp up to my front door, even though I do not require a wheel chair, and am moving out in a couple of weeks anyway. The point is, I feel that I have been discriminated against long enough. I will no longer tolerate such blatant anti-gilbertism (or is it gilbertphobia?).

I may form some kind of foundation as well. We'll have special walks to raise money for Gilbert's Syndrome research. We'll sell yellow rubber bracelets embossed with the phrase "Say No to Bilirubin." Some of the proceeds from the bracelet sales will go to pay for my two recent blood tests. The rest will go towards a copy of the new Eric Clapton CD. Unless the Make-A-Wish foundation gets it for me. Then the bracelet money will help me purchase a bottle of bourbon, you know, as payback for the whole missing enzyme gambit. Take that, stupid liver.

Is that a bomb in your pants?

So last week I had the pleasure of returning to England for a few days to meet with colleages and wrap up some left-over research business. Now typically anytime I am involved in air travel, something goes horribly wrong. I've been delayed, subjected to traffic accidents, had my luggage lost, been party to bus accidents, been seated next to smelly, loud children (sometimes not even my own), and that's just on the way to the airport! Haha, but seriously folks...

Anyway, this most recent trip to the UK was going swimmingly, suspiciously free of anything even slightly irritating (I did get seated next to a mother with a nine-month-old baby on the trip home, but they both slept almost the entire flight, so what do I care?) Both going over and coming back, all the flights were on time, I managed to get the really comfortable bulkhead seats where I can stretch my legs all the way out, it was perfect...until I was collecting my bags at customs coming home Sunday night. That's when things went a bit pear-shaped. First, I had brought back a plastic crate full of books and other assorted items that I had left either at my office in Durham or at a friend's house. When it came down the baggage claim belt, it was wrapped in a plastic bag, and the crate was completely smashed. I think all of the contents are still there, fortunately. But then a woman from Customs and Border Protection came around with a dog who was sniffing at everyone and their luggage (the dog, not the woman). The pair of them had past by me once while I was in line to have my passport checked, and the dog ignored me. Then they came around while I was waiting for my luggage, and they ignored me again. On a second pass a few minutes later, the dog started sniffing me and stuck his nose in my crotch (as dogs do), so the woman started asking if I had any prescription drugs or food in my pants. I didn't so I told her no. She took my customs declaration form and wrote "K9" on it and off she went. Then they came around a third time, and this time the dog started nosing around my busted-up crate. "Oh, great...some malevolent and
opportunistic baggage handler has shoved some kind of contraband into my crate during their 'repair' job," I thought. Anyway, she asked me what was in the crate (the woman, not the dog), and I told her it was mostly books, a pair of computer speakers, and other assorted items one tends to accumulate at the end of moving across creation. So anyway, my backpack finally came down the belt and I was on my way to check out with the customs guy, but of course since my customs form bore the clever K9 mark, I was subjected to "additional screening." I was fearful that I would be put into a dark room while some giant woman named Frieda snapped on some elbow-length rubber gloves and asked me to bend over. To my great relief, it was just a couple of guys who rifled through my computer bag and my backpack (although they did slip into some rubber gloves beforehand). So, while it was a little unnerving to have all of my dirty underpants enthusiastically examined for hidden drugs or explosives, then put on display for the delight of my fellow passengers, at least I wasn't groped by anyone. They didn't bother unwrapping my plastic crate, though. So the two items that the dog actually showed interest in - my crotch and the crate - were left unmolested. My backpack felt humiliated and dirty afterwards, though.

For the record, neither my crotch nor my plastic container contained anything worth getting excited over. I know that doesn't sound right, especially in relation to my crotch, but you know what I mean: I wasn't smuggling anything illegal.

Anyway, I should have known that I can't get away from a transatlantic flight completely free of inconvenience. I think from now on I will just drive...

I didn't know this would be on the exam

I gave the second exam in one of my classes today. After the exam 1 debacle, I decided to allow the class to use notes for this exam. I haven't graded exam 2 yet, but a cursory scan through them indicates that the notes concession will make no discernable difference whatsoever. I don't know what is the matter with people. I am becoming suspicious that my students spend the week before the exam trying to come up with really wrong answers. On the first exam, many of them took to spraying out paragraphs of random nonsense, apparently in hopes of fortuitously stumbling upon a few relevant words. For this exam, I asked that they not write a lot of crap if they don't know an answer, but we'll see if my request was honored. If not, it's probably just because they didn't understand what I had said.

I had hoped, nonetheless, that allowing them to use notes in this exam would ease the burden of actual thinking. However, here's my mistake as I now understand it:To be effective, notes must adhere to the following two principles:

Rule 1: notes are only as helpful as the degree to which they are understood. Since most of my students can barely tie their own shoes (thus the proliferation of flip-flops), I expect that their notes are themselves a random spew of MTV song lyrics, ad slogans from beer commercials, and lists of inane items to tell their roommate on their cell phones (e.g., "oh...my...god...that exam was, like, so hard!").

Rule 2: the effectiveness of notes during an exam depends heavily on them actually being taken prior to the exam.
Corollary to rule 2: Come to class, dumbass!

Even with their notes, most of the class was still puzzling over the exam well after the normal class period had ended. I gave them an extra fifteen minutes beyond this, and then insisted that exams be handed in. One student had the sheer affrontery to suggest that two of the questions were unfair because, "I didn't know this would be on the exam." What? You didn't know it would be on the exam? Geez, how could I have let that happen? But you got the list of correct answers I e-mailed to you, right?

OK, OK. I give up. The final is coming up in a couple of weeks, and I really want to go out on a positive note. So I am going to do my part to make that happen. I am posting the questions that will be on the exam. Not only are they now available well in advance, so there will be no unpleasant surprises, you'll also notice that I have made the questions more amenable to success (that means they're easier).

1. List three words that rhyme with "hair."

2. What is the opposite of "up?"

3. True or false: Shoes go on after socks.

4. Which of the following would you be most likely to find in your kitchen:
a) a giraffe
b) the Apollo 11 landing module
c) a toaster
d) Oprah
e) a toaster
f) approximately
(hint: the answer is a toaster - pick either c or e)

5. What day is it?

6. If I took away all of your pencils, then gave you three pencils, how many pencils would you have?

7. Do these jeans make my butt look big?

8. Suppose your roommate says, "It's raining outside right now." What does this mean?

9. Draw and label a smiley face. Color it yellow and write "Have a nice day" beneath it.

10. What grade would like on this exam?

Extra credit: What day is it?

I realize that these questions have nothing to do with the class I am teaching, so I may be opening myself up to complaints that we didn't go over any of this in class. In my defense, however, what difference could it possibly make?

Reality Bites

In the television universe, summer used to be a festival of reruns. In the modern TV landscape, the reruns have been replaced by so-called reality shows. Some of them I unfortunatetly enjoy, but I daresay they reflect very little actual reality.

There was an episode of "Seinfeld" once where Kramer's girlfriend du jour painted a portrait of him, in which he looked like a dim-witted miscreant. The painting went on display somewhere, and one art patron commented, "He disgusts me - yet I can't look away."

This is how I feel about one reality show in particular - "I Want to be a Hilton." The title alone suggests that the contestants don't just want to have a lot of money, or a great job, or whatever the prize is. They actually want to be someone else. And then the contestants themselves - all the whining and moaning about how they deserve to win? Really? They say things like, "My life has been hard and I've been disappointed a lot, so I deserve to win." Who's life isn't hard? And who hasn't faced a mountain of disappointment? They also say, so optimistically, that if they win they will be happy and fulfilled. Well, good luck with that, I guess.

With some shows, like American Idol and that ilk, the purpose and criteria for success are pretty well defined - you come out and sing a song, and if it sounds pretty good, you can stay, but if you suck, then you pack up and leave. This Hilton show, though, what are the rules? Is it based arbitrarily on who Kathy Hilton likes best that week? If so, the smart money is on the slack-jawed ninny who does the best impersonation of Paris Hilton.

Seriously, is this the best TV we can come up with? OK, it beats C-SPAN (barely), and OK, I sit and watch it like a drooling lobotomy patient (I say things to my wife like, "I like her, I hope she wins," and "They should vote her off - she's just so smug.") but the way I see it, I buy a lot of the crap they advertise on these shows, and the TV networks owe me better.

I'll close with two final thoughts: I miss reruns and God bless Blockbuster video.

An Embarrassment of Junk

It's been a couple of months since my last post. Curiously, no one seems to have noticed! Given that no one reads this except my wife and sometimes my parents, I guess it isn't that curious, in fact. Anyway, since moving back to the US, my high speed internet access has been spotty at best, until this week. We are now online in our new house in South Carolina.

After a week or so in Maryland, we went to Illinois for a month or so. We celebrated Jacob's first birthday on July 3. The next week we left for our new home in Columbia South Carolina. We went on a mini-vacation with my in-laws to Myrtle Beach last week. We celebrated Caitlyn's fourth birthday there. A few days later, after returning to Columbia, we had Michael's fifth birthday party.

While we have unpacked most of what we need to live on a day to day basis, we still have what seems to me like a unusually large number of boxes full of...what? Knick-knacks, pictures, and to be honest, junk that no one needs. But what to do with it all? I think the reason that we have most of this useless stuff is that everytime we move, we face this dilemma. Our respose is to either unpack it all and stuff it into drawers where we never see it, or leave it in boxes shoved in the basement or attic. The trouble is, then next time we move, we have to go through it all again.

I can't quite bring myself to just throw it away, though. You never know when you might need it, after all. Probably as soon as the garbage truck drives off with it, too!

"Not Liberal" equals "Extremist?"

So I made it back to the US with no trouble whatsoever. Hats off to British Airways - everything was on time, they gave me the good bulkhead aisle seat, and they didn't involve me in any traffic accidents on the tarmac (see that, KLM?)

Now I am back and enthralled by the recent political maneuvering in the US Senate. President Bush has nominated several judges for appointments to various federal courts. Now the way I understand the appointment process, from my high school civics class, is that once an nomination is made, the senate should vote on the nominee. If a majority of senators approve the nominnee, the appointment stands, right? I also undertand the role of the fillibuster in the senate to protect the rights of the minority. The question is, exactly whose rights are potentially being trampled by the nomination of conservative judges?

This morning on CNN, Senator Ted Kennedy was talking about the "extremist" judges who were so far out of the judicial mainstream that they were unacceptable. But if these people are so far out of the mainstream, why is there even a possibility that they would be approved? If a majority of senators approve that person, are the senators also extremists? If an extremist view is held by a majority of people, can it really be called extremist, or is that view, by definition, the mainstream? The thing about liberals is that they win arguments by coloring the issues with labels: non-liberals are "extremists," pro-life is "anti-choice," and Christians (a term which itself is becoming derogatory) are "the religious right" or "radical fundamentalists."

One of the common traits among several of the present nominees is their opposition to abortion. One nominee, Priscilla Owen, is criticized in a CNN.com story for seeking to limit the ability of minors to get an abortion without parental consent. "Not everything said about her has always been flattering," CNN tells readers, in its paragraph about her opposition to teenage abortion. How is that unflattering? But this is how liberals operate. Rather than engage in a legitimate discussion of an issue, they resort to name calling and labelling. Rather than explain why children should be allowed to have abortions without notifying parents, and thus why Judge Owen's view is unflattering, they just assert that this is so. And this is the typical means of persuasion used by the left. Conservatives are portrayed as mean, selfish, biggoted fascists, while they present themselves as kind, compassionate voices of the oppressed (unless the oppressed are unborn - then screw 'em).

Take for example recent television ads from MoveOn.org, which portrays Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist as the evil Star Wars Emperor. They claim that the "radical right" is trying to "sieze absolute power." The only way to prevent this is for the minority to fillibuster. What MoveOn PAC fails to explain in the ad is why a fair hearing for the judicial nominees should be denied. We are just left to wonder how such an extremist president got elected (twice) and how the majority of the senate came to be populated with such radical right-wing men and women. Could it be because a moajority of Americans put them there? Perish the thought....

Booked and Bound to Go

I've got the key to the highway
I'm booked and bound to go
I'm gonna leave here running
Walking's most too slow
(from "Key to the Highway," by Big Bill Broonzy)

So I have my electronic plane tickets all booked. I am bound for the golden shores of the United States tomorrow morning. Most of the details of leaving the country, I have sorted out. I have a bit of packing left to do, but otherwise I am merely biding my time until 9:40 AM tomorrow.

Over the weekend I faced the unenviable task of getting rid of my car. The problem with selling a car when your moving is that you don't want to get rid of it too early, because then you're stuck without transportation for however long. But if you wait too long, your options for unloading the car get fewer. I have some experience in this arena, since in the last ten years I have moved great distances more times than I like to remember. The situation has worked out exactly right exactly once. On the other hand, I have twice had cars turn against me in the weeks before moving, and given the lack of time - or more accurately lack of energy - to deal with getting them repaired. On both occasions, I had to get scrap dealers to haul them away, myself getting nothing from the deal beyond the relief of being automotively unfettered.

The situation I found myself in this weekend is, so far, the least satisfying of all of my last minute car trades. I advertised the car, a 1994 Subaru Legacy "estate car" (that's a station wagon to you and me), on the Durham University website for several weeks. All I got out of that was several e-mails from people with names like Bob Anderson and messages that went something like this: "I am very much interested in your (item). Please advice me to you last price. I am pleased to you for accepting my personal cheque for the price of you item. Thanks you very much..." How many Bob Andersons do you know who speak such English? Nonetheless, I responded to the first of these, telling Bob the asking price and offering to have him come out to see the car at his convenience. The reply, translated into standard English, was that he was working on behalf of an American client who wanted to send me a cashier's check for significantly more than the asking price of the car, sight unseen. I would deposit the check, keeping my share for the car, and wiring the remainder to an unspecified shipping agent who would then come and collect the car. Right - that doesn't sound shady at all, does it? Where do I sign? Needless to say I mostly ignored all subesquent contact from Bob and his ilk.

The only serious enquiry about the car came from a fellow member of the university community, but it was while I was away for several weeks. By the time I returned to Durham, this fellow had understandably already found a car. So I sent around an e-mail to all the grad students and research staff in my department, imploring someone to make me any offer - none was to ridiculous. No offers were forthcoming, and my most dreaded last resort was imminent - pimping the car around to low end used car dealers. I would rather deal in black market body parts with circus folk in dark back alleys than negotiate a car sale with a used car salesman, especially the type of used car salesman likely to be interested in my 11 year old Subaru. Alas, this was my fate on Saturday (the car sale, not the back alley body parts thing).

So I pulled into this tiny little yard situated in the back of a row of houses. The "lot" was a fenced in yard about 20 feet on a side, with a dozen cars packed almost close enough to touch each other. The only building was a dilapidated hovel that was missing one of its four walls. The guy is sitting in a metal folding chair surrounded by greasy tools and car parts. I explained that I had called earlier about my Subaru, and was here to have him look at it, and make me an offer. He wandered over to where I had parked the car, his nylon track suit pants whoosh-whooshing as he walked. He sucked his teeth and tut-tutted about the work he'd have to put into before being able to sell it. Then he noticed it had an automatic transmission. This, for some mysterious reason, is the death blow for selling a car in England. I guess because the automatic transmission is still such new, untested technology (it's only been around a mere sixty years or so?), it is viewed with suspicion and skepticism. Besides, anything that makes a task like driving slightly easier is a frivolity to be dispensed with. But I digress. Anyway, after totting up all the failings of my car, and driving it up and down the street a few times, they guy made me a profanely low offer. I was taken aback. Did I hear correctly? "No," I replied, "if I am going to give it away, I'll give it to a friend, or the Salvation Army, or that guy at the pub who looked at me funny." So he added and extra 25 pounds to his offer. He knew I was desperate to sell, and I knew he wasn't going to go much higher than this. And I was desperate to sell, so after thinking about my options (since their really weren't any, this didn't take long) I grudgingly accepted the paltry offer on the condition that he give me a lift back to Durham. On the ride back he had the cheek to point out that he'd saved me the bus fare I would have otherwise had to pay. In my mind I was bashing his smug face into the stearing wheel repeatedly. I spent the rest of the day in a gray cloud of disgust over the advantage taken of me.

But no matter now, right? I'll be off tomorrow into the bright blue yonder, and bright blue future of who-knows-what. I'll see my beautiful wife and my adorable children, and the 94 Subaru will quickly recede from memory.

All in all, I have no regrets about the year and half I've spent here in England. I have learned a lot, made several good friends, picked up some interesting language, and had a son here. So as I prepare to depart these fair shores, I'll say God save the queen, and God bless America!

Monkeys and Morality

On two separate occasions recently, I've found myself embroiled in friendly debates with colleagues over the issue moral relativism. The conversations have both begun with discussions of the pros and cons of Darwinian evolution. Most of my peers in the scientific world will readily defend Darwinism as scientifically proven fact (however, see the Discovery Institute for articles and discussion by academics who find Darwinism unconvincing). I am no young earth special creationist by any means, and my objections to Darwinism don't necessarily stem from my religious convictions. I just see no convincing evidence that one species has evolved into another by accumulating minute genetic changes over vast expanses of time. This is certainly not seen in the fossil record. In fact we find the opposite case in the Earth's record: thick rock sequences representing long periods of time, in which the fossil organisms remain virtually unchanged. Michael Behe, in his book Darwin's Black Box has explained how many of the supposed steps in evolution are what he calls "irreducibly complex." For example, the development of the eye is thought by Darwinists to have evolved in small increments from a light-sesitive spot in lower organisms into the image-forming, color-differentiating eye that most humans enjoy. Behe describes the myriad biochemical reactions and processes that must take place at just the right time in order for the light entering the eye to be transferred to the brain and interpreted as an image with some bearing on the seer's environment. Evolution by increments is not viable here, because all the components necessary for vision must appear together. There is no selective advantage in having an eye that doesn't work. The odds of all of these components appearing simultaneously by random mutations are about the same as that of putting one million monkeys in front of one million typwriters and hoping one of them eventually happens to come up with an exact transcription of Hamlet.

In spite of this evidence against Darwinian evolution, materialist scientists remain convinced that unguided evolution has occurred, because they see the present state of life on Earth, and realize that it had to have become this way somehow. And this is where the real problem with Darwinian thinking occurs - at the very beginning. Proponents of evolution begin with the belief that no higher being can be involved in the workings of the world, and so they have to construct a story to explain how that might have happened. It is a tiring and desperate task imposed on the proverbial monkeys.

This is the point at which my recent converstions have become the most interesting. If human life is the culmination of accumulated random physical and chemical reactions and genetic mutations, with no guiding hand behind it, then life is inherently purposeless. We are here by accident, and your life and mine have no intrinsic value other than what you or I choose to place on it. While this may seem like very enlightened thinking on the surface - each person's beliefs are equally true and should be equally respected - we don't have to follow the train of thought very far before we start seeing that it is an unworkable philosophy. One has only to wonder if this relativist idea is universally true: if it is, then it violates the very principle it proposes, that everyone makes up his or her own beliefs as they see fit. If it isn't true for everyone, then my belief that truth is absolute must be admitted, meaning that as soon as contradicting beliefs are encountered, at least one of them is wrong.

Even disregarding these logical difficulties, the path of moral relativism which Darwinism leaves us to wander ends at a chasm we can not easily cross: the moral principles we live by become nothing more than preferences exactly analaogous to our taste in music or favorite colors. As long as most of us define morality similarly, there are no problems. But what do we say to the psychopath who feels no moral reservation against brutally killing innocent people? We have no reason to abhor mass murder, rape, slavery, and child abuse. In the end morality gets imposed on us by whomever has the most power to enforce it. Hitler, Stalin, Mao...these men were merely following Darwinism to it's logical conclusions, like it or not.

We cannot possibly live with this conclusion. We all recognize that life has intrinsic value. This is why our hearts break when we read stories about babies abandoned in dumpsters being cared for by stray dogs. Once we admit that life does have value, we must conclude that it has purpose. Purpose creates value, and you can't have one without the other. If life does have some meaning, there must be someone to mean it. Suddenly we find ourselves in the hand of God, and we can relinquish our grip on chance and time as the mother and father of life. The monkeys can leave their typewriters and go happily back to the trees.

Hitting the Wall

Being a foreigner is wearying. I have been in England for close to two years, and honestly, I have tried to fit in. I say things like "Cheers, mate" to people I don't know. I have learned how to navigate roundabouts while sitting on the wrong side of the car. I carry an umbrella all the time. I have even forced myself to eat black pudding - once. All in all I think I have shown considerable effort to adapt -"when in Rome" and all that. Nonetheless, I have hit the wall. I just want to go home now. I don't want to do anything - just get on a plane with whatever of my stuff I can carry and leave all else behind. My impending return to the US next week probably exacerbates this feeling of apathy, and the fact that my family has already returned to the States in March doesn't help either.

Living here in England hasn't, in itself, been bad. I have made several good friends here, and have learned a lot of interesting things about geology, as well as the world. It is just exhausting to constantly wish things were like home, and always finding that they're not. There are specific things here that drive me nuts, certain inconveniences I could do without. But some things would be annoying regardless of where I lived. When you are at home, the annoying things don't stand out so much, because, in spite of being irritating, they are "normal."

So I have exactly one week left to be a foreigner, in which time I have to sell a car, sort out some bank accounts, and have my mail forwarded. I will eventually look back with fond memories, and time will blur the inconveniences and frustrations. But for now, I just want to go home.

Does it have to rain EVERY day?

So yesterday and today, the weather has been a tease. I sit inside, and it looks sunny and pleasant. The second I darken the door to go out, it starts raining. And not just a little rain, either. Sheets of rain, sometimes with little bits of ice that sting the backs of my ears. I get to where I am going, and guess what - no more rain. I tried once stepping out and jumping right back inside. It was like a blast from one of those oscillating lawn sprinklers. And here's the best part - it doesn't have to be cloudy to rain. Crystal blue skies, not a cloud to be seen anywhere, and still it rains. I don't know how this works, but I swear that's what happens here. Every day it rains at least a little. If I was a duck I'd be laughing, but I am not a duck, so I am just wet and cold and annoyed.

Actually, I have to admit that last Friday it didn't rain (at least not much). Friday the weather was what I like to call British Nice. It was cold and windy, but there was sunshine and a noticeable lack of rain - that's British Nice weather. Some friends and I went out for a drink after work Friday evening, and realizing that this was as close as we were likely to get to decent weather for some time (ever, really) we decided to sit outside. We splintered off from the larger contingent of Durham geologists amid exhortations that it was probably too cold to sit outdoors. "No, it's British Nice out," I said. We sat down outside, knowing that our indoor friends were keeping tabs on us through the window. We tried to nonchalantly zip up our jackets without being noticed; a campfire would have been decidedly too obvious. We congratulated ourselves on our bravery and fortitude, noting that it really wouldn't be that cold if the wind wasn't turning small dogs into kites. We talked about how warm it probably was in America right now - "It's gotta be in the eighties at least..." We talked about our favorite spicy foods - buffalo wings, barbecued ribs, and chili. None of this seemed to help, so after about a half hour, we slowly and quietly got up one or two at a time - so as not to attract the attention of the indoorsies - and walked casually back inside, trying to act like we had only just arrived. Nonetheless, we had to endure a few smug, we-told-you-so glances.

Well, the sun is out and the wind seems to have diminished now, so perhaps I'll go out for a bit. Now where did I put my umbrella?

Travelling Blues

So I went to Vienna for a meeting last week. No sooner had I arrived, I was stricken - literally stricken - with a raging toothache. I have had a root canal performed on this particular tooth no fewer than three times - the latest one having been done a mere three days prior to my trip to Austria. Aside from dragging myself to the convention center to give my talk, I spent the rest of my three days in Vienna in bed trying to think of something other than blinding pain. It turns out, though, that one can purchase antibiotics over the counter in Austria - a useful bit of information to file away...

Then it was Wednesday - the day for me to return to England, and the pain had diminished markedly overnight, only to be replaced by pumpkinesque swelling on the left half of my face. So I ambled my one-man circus sideshow to the airport, waited for my flight and arrived, uneventfully, in Amsterdam. Now, Amsterdam Schiphol airport was converted from a shopping mall, and as such there are no gates or jetways, as one typically envisions an airport to have. Instead there is a vast parking lot full of KLM planes, which are accessed from the terminal by means of busses. The lady takes your boarding pass and herds you onto a bus which wends its way through the acres of jets, arriving twenty minutes later at the one bound for your particular destination - and its these busses that have a total of about six seats. Everyone else has to stand holding onto one of the poles going from the floor to the ceiling. The bus emptied out, the crowd flowed into the plane and we sat...and sat...and sat. An hour later the pilot announced that they couldn't get the door to shut properly, and so the flight was cancelled. Don't worry, though, the bus will be here shortly to take you back to the terminal for rerouting.

Alright, back onto the bus. At least I was in no real hurry to get home. No one is waiting for me to return, and I can sit around at the airport just as easily as I can sit around the house, right? So the bus begins its scenic trip back to the terminal. We're getting close, I know, because I can see the door I just came the other way through an hour ago. Then with no warning, I am on the floor of the bus! I am on top of some poor guy's luggage, and some other schmoe is on top of mine! Everyone around me is struggling back to their feet because the bus has crashed into a forklift thirty yards from the terminal entrance! So they send another bus to take us the long way around to the terminal.

To compensate the planeload of irate passengers, here's what KLM gave us: a telephone calling card good for three minutes in the Netherlands (I don't know any Dutch people, but even if I did, it would take me longer than three minutes to tell this story); Ten euros worth of food and drinks in the airport, the equivalent of about fifteen US dollars or, apparently, a slice of pizza, large Coke, and a chocolate bar. No kidding - that menu came to 9.40 Euros! And I didn't even get the sixty cents change back; and finally a voucher for fifty euros off any regular KLM fare. Like I'll be flying with KLM again any time soon...good luck with that..

Anyway, I was on the next flight from Amsterdam to Newcastle, which went off without any trouble. After a Metro ride and a train trip, I was back in Durham safe and, if not quite sound (remember the facial gigantism?) at least glad to be done travelling for a couple of weeks...

Seashells

So I am stuck here in England for a couple more weeks to finish up some work before relocating back home to America. Some friends and I went to Bamburgh castle on the northeast cost of England last weekend, and had a pretty nice day. The weather started out pretty ugly, but improved remarkably by mid-afternoon. We meandered up and down the beach in the sunshine after touring through the castle, picking up seashells along the way. As my collection grew, it prompted memories of doing the exact same thing with my family on Galveston Island when I was a boy (although there are few medieval castles in Texas). This moment of nostalgia forcefully reminded me that I have had a pretty good life so far all in all. I've never been seriously ill. My parents and sisters, neices and nephews, brothers-in-law are all in good health. I have four children who inspire me every day. I have a fascinating, beautiful wife that loves me and means the world to me and makes me want to be better than I am. Whatever else happens in life, I am grateful to God for these things. Maybe I'll get a good, permanent job soon, maybe I won't. Maybe my finances will become stable and comfortable, maybe they won't. I don't know what lies around time's corner, and I am not sure I really want to. I am learning (albeit slowly) to appreciate all the good things in my life on the one hand, and to let go of the clutter that doesn't matter on the other.